NO matter how bad your swim is, I suggest not holding a 24mph average for as long as you can, it will make the end of the race hurt in my case the last 16 miles on the bike and the whole run. Besides that, have fun. Oh and take in more than you think on the bike for calories.

Well, Swimming is my strongest event of the 3, with biking coming in 2nd and running is more in name than actually accomplishing a run. My longest swims were in the range of 3k-3.5k.

Race Report.
My swim took me something like 34 minutes and was a loop course. The lake was pretty cold at about 64 degrees. I started on the right side of the main group and that seemed to work out by not having a boxing match at the start. It went pretty well expect in the last few strokes coming out of the water my left calf cramped up. A bad sign after a few minutes of a multi hour race. So I hobbled into T1 and got geared up for the bike.
The bike got off to a pretty good start. I was able to stretch out my calf during the first few minutes of the bike and ended up not having any more trouble with it the rest of the day. Since I'm a better swimmer than anything else, I get passed the rest of the day. So the better cyclists went cruising along. Although a few of them were pumped early on and slowed down toward the end of the 61 mile course.(yea, it's alittle longer than normal). The one very notable hill Mud Hill is about 2 miles long (estimated since my bike computer went out while running out of T1 and I didn't stop to fix it) and very steep in spots. bad for clydes like me. The upside is the downhill on the other side where I must have been traveling somewhere between 35-40mph for a few minutes. Good breather. Coming into T2 I just about dropped the bike after I dismounted. It was ass heavy and just started to swing over. I saved it and jogged into T2.
The run (13.1 miles) is the farthest I have ever run. My previous farthest is 6.2 miles in my Olys this year. Probably not smart to try this but no one ever accused me of being smart. Started out with the pace I wanted, but by mile 5 I was starting to slow down quite a bit. I ended up walking 1/2 mile and then started running at mile 6. At about mile 8 I did the same thing. Then by mile 10 I was walking every hill and running down the other side. Well I ended up averaging just about what I wanted, the walks didn't slow down my time very much as even when I run I'm not very fast. My run time was around 3 hrs. My race went pretty much as I predicted and with my lovely wife as support I had an easy trip back into Portland. I had a great time and will be doing a few more next year.

Good job, barleyrocket. If Saturday morning was anything like Sunday morning, getting into the water was a blessing. It was downright chilly waiting in line Sunday morning to pick up race packets.

I signed up for Black Diamond wanting to try an olympic distance race, but after some consideration, I opted for the olympic duathlon (bike/run) instead of the tri. Since this was my 4th multisport race in 6 weekends, my weekdays have been more devoted to recovery and maintenance, and doubling the swim distance over last weekend's kirkland 1/2 mile swim (which was a doubling over the races before it), seemed a bit much.

The duathlon start was in time-trial fashion, with 2 riders starting every 15 seconds. I started in the 8th pair, and after passing a few people stayed in the top 10 for most of the leg, fading 3-4 places towards the end as I backed off a bit for the run. The 25 mile course had about 1200 feet of total climbing but even so I came in at 1:14, averaging just over 20 mph for the first time of the 4 races - I had a really good (enjoyable) time on that leg. I didn't have any cramps on the run this time, but there were parts of the run where I was more uncomfortable than I can remember being for a long time, but somehow I just gritted my teeth and didn't stop or walk - came in just over an hour.

Thsi is the last multisport race of the year for me. I signed up for a local 5K run next Sunday, and then the switch to my usual XC ski race training is on for real.

it was a cold morning. and I know 2 people that didn't wear wet suits during the swim. Yea baby. 'I was in the pool, I was in the pool'. This winter training will consist mostly of running for me. I'll continue to bike to work and swim once in a while but i'm in the top 25% of swimmers and mop for biking and last 3 (not last 3 percent but actually the last 3 people) for most races in running. I've never run consistantly and that is my big goal for the offseason. we'll see what next year brings. It was a good way to spend a saturday (but I would have like to see the UW get smacked by ND, not too much offense to any Huskies out there)

it was a cold morning. and I know 2 people that didn't wear wet suits during the swim. Yea baby. 'I was in the pool, I was in the pool'. This winter training will consist mostly of running for me. I'll continue to bike to work and swim once in a while but i'm in the top 25% of swimmers and mop for biking and last 3 (not last 3 percent but actually the last 3 people) for most races in running. I've never run consistantly and that is my big goal for the offseason. we'll see what next year brings. It was a good way to spend a saturday (but I would have like to see the UW get smacked by ND, not too much offense to any Huskies out there)

I think you are an older version of me....I am planning on running like crazy this year....my goal is a 4 hour marathon in IM Florida 2006. Now it is just keeping up my training to do that.